President Barack Obama has called on Congress to grant him fast-track trade authority for his Trans-Pacific Partnership free-trade agreement. The administration insists the authority, which would give Congress only an up-or-down vote on the agreement, is needed to get the best possible terms from its trade partners along the Pacific Rim. During his 2008 presidential campaign, Obama promised to renegotiate and improve the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). But it now looks like what he really meant is to expand on that flawed trade model and extend it to other countries. Twenty-one years after NAFTA and four years after...

Tyler Durden 02/16/2015 You know things are bad in the ship-building business when... amid considerably larger than expected losses, China's COSCO announced that it has dis-assembled 8 vessels in January alone (including 3 bulk carriers) and will be decommissioning and disposing of them as it awaits a "more conducive" environment. It appears that is not coming anytime soon, as The Baltic Dry Index just hit 522 - a new all-time low (down a stunning 53 of the last 55 days). As COSCO explains in its HKSE Statement:(snip)

An odd marriage of convenience between liberal Democrats and Tea Party Republicans is squeezing President Obama on his ambitious trade agenda, forcing the White House and top Republicans to fight a two-front war on an international economic effort the president hopes to secure before he leaves office. An alliance between the likes of Representatives Louie Gohmert and Dana Rohrabacher — two of the House’s most conservative members — and Rosa DeLauro and Louise Slaughter — ardent liberals — is unlikely enough. But as the political fringes expand on each end, they are challenging another strange-bedfellows alliance between Mr. Obama and...

Chinese and Argentine leaders on Wednesday signed a batch of agreements, including collaboration on two new nuclear power plants, as Beijing is strengthening its relations with the South American country. On a state visit to China, Argentine President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner met with Chinese President Xi Jinping and the two countries signed 15 agreements covering travel visas, information technology, media, energy, space technology and financing. The financial amounts of the deals were not disclosed.

So, that happened: This week, we learned that President Barack Obama is really upset with our coverage of the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal. So he's not gonna like what we're about to do, which is talk about the fact that the one part of his agenda Congress might sign on to is the trade deal every liberal hates.

PHILADELPHIA – President Obama on Thursday asked wary House Democrats to hold their fire, while the administration negotiates several trade deals opposed by scores of liberal lawmakers. “Keep your powder a little dry,” he told the Democrats assembled here for an annual retreat, according to a source in the closed-door session. "Get informed," Obama also advised, "not by reading The Huffington Post." The president has long sought pacts expanding trade with both Asian and European nations, as well as trade promotion authority, known as "fast-track," from Congress. The issue has sharply divided the Democrats, as centrists tend to support the...

SEE: Critical of Obama’s past actions, GOP now wants to give him more power on trade ”Republicans have consistently railed at President Obama’s exercise of his executive authority, disparaging him as “an emperor” who has ignored Congress on immigration, climate and Cuba. Now that they fully control the Congress, those same Republicans critics are on the verge of handing the president expansive new powers to circumvent those who want to stand in his way on trade. GOP leaders in both chambers are close to introducing legislation that would grant the administration broad authority to finalize one of the largest free-trade...

Stockholm (AFP) - Sales by Russian arms manufacturers continue to expand thanks to Moscow's investments despite a downturn in global defence spending, a Stockholm-based think-tank said Monday. "The remarkable increases in Russian companies' arms sales in both 2012 and 2013 are in large part due to uninterrupted investments in military procurement by the Russian government during the 2000s," said Siemon Wezeman, senior researcher at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). Sales by Russian-based arms firms grew by 20 percent in 2013, according to SIPRI. However, figures for the 100 biggest arms-dealing nations excluding China declined for the third year...

Just thought it was worth posting, since it now appears we are about to break the bad record we had established: The US / China trade balance appears to be heading for setting, another (bad) record this year. Go into any store. Pick up anything. Anywhere. Odds are it is imported, from China. Just saying.

Allows direct business between Canadian dollar and Chinese yuan, cutting exchange costs. Canada and China have signed a reciprocal currency deal that's expected to dramatically boost exports. The hub will foster far easier trade between the Canadian dollar and the Chinese yuan, also known as the renminbi. It makes Canada the first country in the Americas to have a deal to trade in the renminbi.

The goal: Show voters right away that Republicans arenâ€™t mere obstructionists, as Democrats so often claim, but are capable of passing popular bills that even Obama might be willing to sign. This ainâ€™t your daddyâ€™s GOP, they mean to say. And by â€śyour daddy,â€ť they of course mean â€śTed Cruz.â€ť With the 2016 presidential campaign already looming large, McConnell (Ky.) and Boehner (Ohio) are both eager to shed the partyÂ’s image as an unruly collection of obstructionists and far-right ideologues.The remedy, they have decided: Act quickly to send President Obama bills with bipartisan support to fast-track international trade agreements,...

America needs an intelligent, aggressive, integrated policy of discovering what its southern neighbors want and accommodating them so that all sides gain. Or soon that heat wave coming up from the south will be fire from the mouth of the dragon Bucaramanga, Colombia—Step aside, EU! China is set to become Latin America’s second-largest trading partner in two years. And 13 years later it will be king of the hill according to the journal China Policy Review. Yes, having locked up Asia and Africa, the ever-hungry Chinese dragon is salivating over what the U.S. at least used to consider its “back...

APPEASEMENT POLITICS In a concession to Russia, Ukraine and the European Union agreed delay implementation of a major trade agreement until the start of 2016, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said. They also appeared to be preparing to make more concessions after the ratification of the agreement, scheduled for next week. EU Trade Commissioner Karl de Gucht said in Brussels that Ukraine, Russia and EU also agreed on extending unilateral trade preferences for Ukraine until the end of 2015 as well. They allowed Ukraine to boost exports to EU by 14 percent in the first half of this year,...

Five years ago talent was plentiful, companies could easily recruit for supply chain planners, and it was easier to recruit supply chain graduates - Not so today. The biggest issues are in mid-management roles. Let’s examine some of the facts from recent research. Today, 60% of companies have open positions. Fifteen percent of the planning positions are open for an average time of five months. An IBM surveys report that 51% of companies are seeing an increase in turnover of supply chain leaders. Have I convinced you yet to be worried? If so, let’s start working on an answer. Let...

Tuesday marks the anniversary of one of the most destructive pieces of legislation in U.S. history: the Hawley-Smoot Tariff Act of 1930, which triggered a disastrous trade war, intensified the Great Depression and helped set the stage for World War II. Unfortunately, as the Affordable Care Act and Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act demonstrate, Washington continues its long-held tradition of passing ill-conceived legislation. The Affordable Care Act and Dodd-Frank, both passed in 2010, clearly have hurt the U.S. economy: increasing business costs, slowing hiring, adding to the uncertainty that investors face. But Hawley-Smoot arguably was worse. The...

And while tea party groups and talk radio hosts are celebrating the downfall of a Republican member of Congress who came to symbolize the “establishment,” there are indications that this enthusiasm is misplaced. In the wake of his victory, Brat joined MSNBC host Chuck Todd on Wednesday where he received a gentle grilling and was asked for his position on a variety of policy matters. Brat seemed entirely unprepared to have to speak on issues of substance. In fact, he suggested – perhaps (hopefully) jokingly – that he thought Todd invited him on the program merely to celebrate his victory....

Members of Congress on Monday learned they were not among the top 90 people to be told of the deal President Obama cut with terrorists for the release of five top Taliban commanders at Guantanamo Bay in exchange for a U.S. soldier. [SNIP] Obama’s decision “to trade five battle-hardened Taliban commanders, directly responsible for the deaths of thousands, for deserter-collaborator Bowe Bergdahl was unanimously rejected by both houses of Congress, including the Democrat-controlled Senate, when the proposal was brought to Congress in 2011 and 2013.” Farah pointed out that after that rejection, administration officials “publicly and repeatedly vowed to return...

The British hostage Peter Moore was dramatically set free yesterday after the United States handed over an Iraqi insurgent suspected of planning the deaths of five American servicemen. Mr Moore, an IT consultant, was freed by League of the Righteous, or Asaib al-Haq (AAH) — an extremist Shia group allied to Iran — after 31 months and spent his first night of freedom at the British Embassy in Baghdad. He is expected to fly home today.

A UK man held hostage in Iraq for more than two-and-a-half years has revealed harrowing details of the torture meted out to him by his captors. In media interviews two months after his release, Peter Moore told how he was subject to mock executions and hung from a door by his arms as a punishment. The computer expert was released unharmed in December after 31 months in captivity during which all four of his bodyguards - abducted with him - are thought to have been killed. Moore, 36, told The Times newspaper how guards put a gun to his head...

China's northeastern port of Qingdao has halted shipments of aluminium and copper due to an investigation by authorities, causing concern among bankers and trade houses financing the metals, trading and warehousing sources said on Monday. Port authorities could not immediately be reached for comment. China has a public holiday on Monday. "We were told we can't ship any material out while they do this investigation," a source at a trading house said. The port of Qingdao is China's third-largest foreign trade port and the world's seventh-largest port, trading with 700 ports in more than 180 countries, according to its website...

If anyone doubts that the five senior Taliban leaders President Obama released this weekend will return to the fight and kill more Americans, they need only look at what happened when the George W. Bush administration released a Taliban leader named Mullah Abdul Qayyum Zakir (a.k.a. Abdullah Ghulam Rasoul) in 2007.

Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel said the U.S. did not negotiate with terrorists in the process of exchanging the transfer of five terrorism suspects for the release of the only American prisoner of war in Afghanistan. “We didn’t negotiate with terrorists,” Mr. Hagel said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “And I said and explained before, Sergeant Bergdahl is a prisoner of war. That’s a normal process in getting your prisoners back.” Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl was handed over to U.S. special forces by the Taliban Saturday, with the government of Qatar serving as a go-between. Qatar is taking custody of five...

Top Republicans on the Senate and House Armed Services Committee criticized President Obama on Saturday for negotiating with the Taliban in releasing five Guantanamo Bay prisoners for the release of Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl. "Trading five senior Taliban leaders from detention in Guantanamo Bay for Berghdal's release may have consequences for the rest of our forces and all Americans," said Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) and Rep. Buck McKeon (R-Calif.), the Senate Armed Services ranking member and House Armed Services chairman, respectively, in a joint statement. A senior White House official said the U.S. transferred five Afghan Guantanamo detainees to Qatar...

As the EU slowly recovers from its economic doldrums, member nations vie for U.S. investment and logistical services while shippers increase their willingness to enlarge operations on the continent. With $1 trillion in trade taking place between the U.S. and the 27 nations comprising the European Union (EU), the potential impact of a new transatlantic trade pact is truly significant. The combined population of 800 million generates almost half of the world’s gross domestic product and represents 40 percent of global trade. But while negotiators for the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) have yet to iron out a deal,...

One of the standard arguments about Britain’s membership of the European Union is that it’s vital that we stay in because so much of our trade is with other European Union countries. Implicit in this is the claim that this is a result of our being in the EU. The dropping of trade restrictions resulting from the Single Market rules for example. The problem with this argument is that it depends upon an empirical claim: that Britain’s trade with the European Union countries has increased since the foundation of that Single Market. And it turns out that that doesn’t seem...

The US is on the brink of losing its status as the world’s largest economy, and is likely to slip behind China this year, sooner than widely anticipated, according to the world’s leading statistical agencies. The US has been the global leader since overtaking the UK in 1872. Most economists previously thought China would pull ahead in 2019....

Historians will one day look back at the presidency of Barack Obama and highlight the administration’s dangerous willingness to short-circuit the Constitution when convenient. From refusing to enforce immigration laws and disregarding rules governing presidential appointments to the outright takeover of our health care system, President Obama has repeatedly painted outside the lines to reward his friends, punish his enemies or to achieve his legislative and political objectives. There can be little debate that Hollywood and the recording industry have been some of the president’s strongest allies. They invested millions in his reelection campaign and are often credited with helping...

Consumers can now receive bitcoin when they trade in their old electronics through a new startup called Mintspare. Galfry Puechavy, Mintspare’s CEO, told CoinDesk that the company’s goal is to be a simple way to get started with bitcoin:

Billionaire businessman Donald Trump ditched the teleprompter at the Conservative Political Action Conference on Thursday and received huge ovations as he slammed President Barack Obama's leadership both at home and abroad. "We have so many problems — and we have so little leadership," Trump said at the session in suburban Washington. "It's all about the leadership." He cited China's move this week to devalue its currency against the American dollar, as well as Russian President Vladimir Putin's assault on Ukraine as examples of the United States' decline as a world power. "The reason why they're doing it is because our...

What's in a name? It's an age-old question Juliet once asked Romeo in Shakespeare's famed play.Today, it's a serious question between the U.S. and the European Union, which has said it wants U.S. food makers to stop using European names.But depending on what food you're talking about, a name could be a lot, says Kyle Cherek, the producer and host of a TV show called Wisconsin Foodie.Cherek argues that certain products are so unique that only one country or region should be allowed to lay claim. So, for example, he says only onions from Vidalia, Ga., should be called American...

In order for our current level of debt-fueled prosperity to continue, the rest of the world must continue to use our dollars to trade with one another and must continue to buy our debt at ridiculously low interest rates. Of course the number one foreign nation that we depend on to participate in our system is China. China accounts for more global trade than anyone else on the planet (including the United States), and most of that trade is conducted in U.S. dollars. This keeps demand for our dollars very high, and it ensures that we can import massive quantities...

Mexico and China have been painted by many politicians and unions as enemies to the American economy. Those two countries and Canada helped Michigan set a record for exports in 2013 of $58.46 billion, according to the U.S. Department of Commerce, topping the 2012 mark of $56.99 billion. Canada was the No. 1 consumer of Michigan goods at $25.94 billion, up from $25.4 billion in 2012. Mexico was No. 2 at $12.17 billion, a 16 percent increase from 2012. China was No. 3 at $4.15 billion, a 27 percent increase from 2012. Michigan's exports to China have increased from $211...

For the second day in a row, chunks of ice fell from the Freedom Tower — but this time streets remained open and Port Authority officials didn’t close the nearby PATH station. Instead, pedestrians had to fend for themselves, scurrying for cover about 11 a.m. Saturday in the shadow of the nation’s tallest building. “We just saw ice falling down the building,” said startled Austrian tourist Katharina Amann, 24, who is visiting the city with her family. “It was scary. Then I heard it shatter.” Ice also fell from 7 World Trade Center, which is 52 stories tall, some chunks...

Today is the day, that our trade figures were released for 2013. Once again, America has failed to gain any appreciable trade volume, vs China. Go into any American store, look on any shelf, and all the stuff is "Made in China". The big problem is: in China, all the things are "Made in China" as well.

You may never heard of it but "The Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) is a trade agreement that is presently being secretly negotiated between the European Union and the United States. It aims at removing trade barriers in a wide range of economic sectors to make it easier to buy and sell goods and services between the EU and the US. On top of cutting tariffs across all sectors, the EU and the US want to tackle barriers behind the customs border – such as differences in technical regulations, standards and approval procedures. These often cost unnecessary time and...

Legislation key to President Barack Obama’s agenda to boost exports to the fast-growing economies of the Asia-Pacific is being welcomed by business but faces stiff opposition from Obama’s fellow Democrats. A bill to grant the president “fast track” authority for negotiating trade deals was introduced Thursday, co-sponsored by a senior Democrat and two leading Republicans. Fast track, which was last approved in 2002 and expired in 2007, assures that the administration can negotiate trade deals that Congress can accept or reject but cannot change.The administration will be counting on strong support from Republicans, who traditionally are more supportive of free...

China is poised to become the world's top trading nation, a position long held by the United States. China reported Friday that its total trade for 2013 reached $4.2 trillion, a sharp increase over the previous year. It is the first time the world's most populous country has cleared the $4 trillion barrier, a feat accomplished despite lackluster numbers for the final month of the year. The U.S. has not yet reported trade numbers for December, but China is virtually assured the top ranking. In the first 11 months of the year, U.S. imports and exports totaled $3.5 trillion, according...

Â Home / Breaking News / USTR Report: Chinese Government Creates Friction for Global Trade Dan Ritter Google+ Twitter | More Articles December 29, 2013 Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/timokl/ Chinaâ€™s economic development depends as much on international diplomacy as it does on domestic investment and political reform. According to state-run news agency Xinhua, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said earlier this month that one of Chinaâ€™s top economic priorities for 2014 will be economic diplomacy, conducted with the goal of capitalizing on opportunities to grow both the domestic and global economy.Itâ€™s hard to understate the increasingly important role that China plays in...

US Secretary of State John Kerry will offer Israeli and Palestinian negotiators a political trade-off: Israeli recognition of the 1967 lines as a basis for the future Palestinian state, in return for Palestinian recognition of Israel as the state of the Jewish people, Palestinian sources told the Saudi daily Al-Watan on Sunday. According to the sources, the mutual recognition will constitute the core of a framework agreement to be signed by the end of January, and negotiated in greater detail during the following months. "The coming weeks will be difficult for the Palestinian and Israeli sides, since they will need...

Twenty years ago, millions of Americans were cocking their ears — waiting to hear a "giant sucking sound."They feared Mexico would begin vacuuming up U.S. manufacturing jobs as soon as President Clinton signed the North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA, on Dec. 8, 1993. The "sucking sound" famously had been forecast in 1992 by Ross Perot, the businessman turned independent presidential candidate.Clinton won the election, and began pushing for NAFTA's passage. He promised the sprawling trade agreement would become a wealth generator as it pulled together the economies of Canada, the United States and Mexico.Who turned out to be...

One thing we can say about Barack Obama is that he is a proven liar. He lied when he told Americans we could keep our health insurance if we liked it. Now he wants us to trust him on something else. For the last several years, the Obama Administration has been negotiating something called the Trans Pacific Partnership. The Trans Pacific Partnership is a free trade agreement on steroids. In 1992, then-Presidential candidate Ross Perot coined the expression, “Giant sucking sound” to describe the exodus of jobs from America into Mexico if the North American Free Trade Agreement was passed....

The Obama administration is secretly negotiating a treaty that could have significant effects on domestic law. Officially, it's a "free trade" treaty among Pacific rim countries, but a section of the draft agreement leaked in 2011 suggested that it will require signers, including the United States, to make significant changes to copyright law and enforcement measures. **SNIP** Now, as Maira Sutton at the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) notes, the New York Times editorial board has endorsed the TPP. While the editorial acknowledges that some are "worried about provisions on intellectual property that could restrict the availability of generic medicines and...

"The new data show that consumer demand surged in the United States just as it lagged in the European Union and China. The value of goods and services imported to the U.S. increased to $228.6 billion, while exports dipped to $189.4 billion." Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2013/09/china-drives-uptick-in-us-trade-deficit-96257.html#ixzz2hKHVkSeH

In a recent op-ed in The Detroit News, Teamsters President James Hoffa criticized trade deals in the United States saying, “It is time America’s major import wasn’t cheap foreign goods and its major export wasn’t good U.S. jobs.” Hoffa used the South American country of Colombia to make his point, saying that exports to the U.S. from Colombia fell 4.5 percent between May 2012 and March 2013. But if Hoffa is implying that the U.S., and Michigan, are being hurt by trade deals, he won’t find much support from the Department of Commerce. For example, exports from the U.S. to...

The global cabal of U.N. Agenda 21 is behind global warming, regionalism, zoning, land and water use control, wealth redistribution, weakening and eventual replacement of the dollar as the world’s reserve currency, global warming, cap and trade, Smart Grid, Smart Meters, carbon taxes, high gasoline prices, global citizens, IB World Schools, Common Core nationalized education standards, biofuels, Marxist advancement across the globe, food control, water access control via the Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST), gun control, health control, the Arab Spring/Winter, unchecked illegal immigration, and they are unstoppable. They’ve had 100 years of preparation ahead of us. Their effort...

What's up with so many Democrats wanting missile strikes on Syria, while Republicans balk? I'm told Republicans are the war party. Is this just hypocrisy? Politicians change their position on military intervention when their own party controls the White House? Historian Thaddeus Russell says it's not. He says it's always been "progressive" Democrats who led America into war: Woodrow Wilson in World War I, FDR in World War II, Truman in the Korean War, Kennedy and Johnson in Vietnam and Bill Clinton in Somalia and Kosovo. Russell says the progressives like "nation-building" because it fits their view that government can...